Many thanks to Efthimios Iosfidis, open source maker and developer, for submitting this Field Report

This past Easter, I had the opportunity to tinker with the Anavi Macro Pad 8, produced by Leon Anavi and Anavi Technologies. This particular piece of open source hardware is a custom-programmable, miniature eight-key keypad that let’s you reprogram a macro or dedicated shortcut to each key: from simple keyboard combinations like the usual copy/paste to complete Git or shell commands with arguments. It is so amazing and configurable that it shouldn’t be missing from any software builder’s desk, since it can make your coding productivity explode.

The MCU behind everything is the Microchip ATmega32U4, which is mounted on a PCB equipped with eight mechanical-type Gateron switches, all contained and protected by an acrylic case. There is also an OLED screen that presents various useful information to the user. The software that controls the hardware is powered by the Quantum Mechanical Keyboard open source firmware. Since it is open source, anyone can write their own set of macros and commands for each key, which is called a keymap.

From my side, when I received the package from Anavi I decided to first modify the hardware a little bit and raise the keypad 15 degrees from the back side with metal stand-offs. Then I coded some keymaps for the VisualStudio code that allows the user to perform cut/copy/paste, select all text, save, undo, redo, issue block or line comments, and delete and introduce brackets such as ()[]{}.

Since I want to give back to the community, I pushed and merged the Visual Code keymap to the QMK official repository.